JERUSALEM, Nov. 3 – Following Yoram Kaniuk’s public apostasy from Judaism, Rael, founder and leader of the International Raelian Movement (www.rael.org), named Kaniuk an “Honorary Guide of Humanity.”

Kaniuk cited personal reasons for departing from his native Judaism. For Raelians, it simply makes sense to leave a religious group when its actions are in contradiction to its founding philosophy and principles.“Considering the way the religious state of Israel is treating the neighboring Palestine, we should expect a massive departure of true Jews from Judaism,” said Leon Mellul, Grand Rabbi for Israel’s Raelian Movement. “True Jews are meant to bring love and harmony to all, according to their scriptures, and although we don’t see a massive departure from Judaism, the Raelians of IsRael are glad to see that Yoram Kaniuk showed such a courageous path.”

Mellul said Kaniuk is the latest in a succession of Israeli-born Jews to denounce injustices carried out by the Israeli government against Palestinians, and then receive the Honorary Guide of Humanity title from Rael. Others thus honored include Gilad Atzmon, Yoav Shamir, Norman Finklestein, Ilan Pappe and, of course, Mordechai Vanunu, for his lifelong effort to make the Middle East nuclear free.

Mellul said Rael has long encouraged people of all faiths to apostatize if they find themselves in conflict with any part of their religion.

“Rael founded apostasynow.org many years ago to help people of all faiths officially and publicly apostatize if their consciences are not in perfect harmony with the teachings or policies of the religion in which they were raised,” Mellul explained. “For example, anyone who supports women in the priesthood, or who supports contraception, abortion or homosexuality, should officially leave the Catholic religion because the Vatican accepts none of those things. And anyone opposed to the suppression of women should leave any of the monotheistic religions, since they all very much keep women in a subservient societal role. Apostatizing will decrease the number of members these religions can claim, which will eventually greatly reduce the social and political power these religions currently have. So the act of apostasy is not a selfish act. It is a way to denounce the system and lead the way for change. We deeply hope that Mr. Kaniuk will inspire many others in Israel to leave Judaism!”

( C ) 2011 Jews4Rael This site is powered by e107, which is released under the terms of the GNU GPL License.